DOVER – Veteran Delaware radio executive Pete Booker has been named the new general manager of Delaware Public Media, the NPR affiliate for the First State, effective Sept. 6.
He will succeed longtime President Jane Vincent, who will retire but remain with DPM to focus on development in an advisory role.
Founded in 2009 as a live-streamed news service, DPM acquired a radio license and, in partnership with the University of Delaware and Delaware State University, began broadcasting over 91.1 FM WDDE from studios on DSU’s Dover campus on Aug. 17, 2012. The station celebrated its 10th anniversary by connecting with former executives and broadcasters to share their memories.
DPM’s programming blends content produced by NPR and other non-commercial media outlets with Delaware-specific news, features, and commentary.
Booker comes to DPM after 33 years at the former Delmarva Broadcasting Company, where he was president and CEO from 1993 until his retirement in 2015. That company, which was acquired by Forever Media in 2019, operated Delaware radio staples like WDEL and WXDE, news talk stations; and WSTW and Eagle 97.7, pop hits stations.
“We are thrilled to be celebrating a decade as an essential, trusted source for Delaware news, and we are deeply grateful to the listeners, partners, donors, and program sponsors who have helped us reach this milestone,” said Randy Farmer, DPM board chair, in a statement. “And we couldn’t be more excited about our future, especially now that our team includes the unparalleled combination of Pete Booker as general manager and Tom Byrne, Delaware’s dean of broadcast journalism, as news director. The board offers our thanks to Jane Vincent for her work the past five years, and we are delighted that she remains committed to DPM.”
In the seven years since leaving Delmarva Broadcasting, Booker and his wife, Susan, founded Smart Drive, a nonprofit that promoted safe driver training for teens following the deaths of three young people they knew. In 2018, they merged their nonprofit into the long-running Delaware Safety Council, where Booker then served as an interim executive director.
During that time, he also served as a consultant to Vincent, who came to the radio station with a significant track record in nonprofit management, but not broadcasting. When he heard that DPM was going to be looking for a new leader, he decided to pursue the opportunity.
“I thought I could give it a good go. I’m very familiar with where the opportunities are with Delaware Public Media and where there’s some areas on the operational side that we can address to make it stronger than it is now,” he told Delaware Business Times, noting that he’s taking over a strong organization due to Vincent’s leadership.
The outlet recently discussed its long-term vision to be a full-service media organization rather than just a local NPR channel, Booker said. He credited Byrne, the founding DPM news director, for continuously finding strong reporting talent to cover the state, and Booker said he wanted to help bring out the best delivery in their broadcasting.
One of his biggest goals will be to develop the station’s funding streams. Because it is a nonprofit station, it cannot sell commercial advertisements like many of its rivals. It can air paid, non-commercial announcements, which frequently include governmental entities and other nonprofits, but it has to be wary about what for-profit clients can say on its airwaves. Booker will also look to boost donations to the station.
“We want to deliver the value proposition as consistently as we can,” he said.
Taking over at DPM is a homecoming in some ways for Booker, who transitioned WDEL from a full-service station to a news and information station. He recruited some of Delaware’s most well-known radio broadcasters like Allan Loudell, Peter MacArthur, Rick Jensen, and Al Mascitti, for the station.
“The idea was to slowly, consistently build a really high-quality operation that had objective, on-the-spot news. We put the resources into it, we got the results, and then apart from that, we had our opinion programming and we were always careful to separate the two,” he recalled. “What we did at WDEL when I was in charge of the company is where we are taking Delaware Public Media.”
Booker isn’t looking in the rearview mirror though, as he believes DPM, and radio at large, should embrace the modern trends of listeners seeking out airwaves via their smartphones and absorbing segments and special content via podcasts. NPR has become a leader in podcast production, between Consider This, It’s Been A Minute, Fresh Air and more, and Booker intends to get DPM more involved in that medium. It also recently launched a newly designed smartphone app and will continue to update its news website.
“No public information organization can afford to just keep relying on their core asset that got them to where they are anymore. We’ve all got to branch out,” he said. “We intend to take advantage of resources that we have; taking great reporting, great journalism, and great features and presenting that in all the forms that we think people are going to want to access it.”
